Heaven's Night
by KatieByHerself
Summary: He didn't drown, and now he's wandering, drawn to the lights of the bar like a moth to the flames.  Yaoi, explicit.  Consider yourself warned.


_**Author's Note:**_

_If you're here because you're after James/PH action, skip this italicized part and enjoy the porn._

_If you're here because you've read "Out of the Shadows" and "Return to the Shadows" and enjoyed them, then you might want to stick around for the warning._

_One of the fun things about writing fanfiction is it gives you a chance to play with other people's characters and do things to them that you wouldn't do to your own creations. The following is a "James Without Harry" story; imagine "Out of the Water," except Harry wasn't around to pull James out of the lake. That should tell you right there that it doesn't end well for our blonde hero. This is, however, the same James featured in my other stories... if you're a careful reader, you'll definitely notice that this is essentially the same person, only in a very different set of circumstances._

_This is based on a pair of comic drawn by two friends of mine. You can find the comics here _.com/gallery/?offset=72#/d2zycwq _and__ here _.com/gallery/?offset=72#/d2zyd8j_. I strongly recommend reading them first before continuing, and if you don't like where they lead, you may want to sit this one out._

He wandered the foggy streets, his sodden clothes dripping water and leaving a disjointed, looping trail behind him. He kept waiting for the monsters to come out at him, to attack him now that he was helpless, all his weapons gone, all his supplies, all his hopes, sunk to the bottom of Toluca Lake. In fact, he would have welcomed an attack, probably would have thrown his arms wide and embraced the monster, would have smiled as he felt its teeth or blades or acid sinking and tearing into his flesh.

But the monsters had left town, abandoned it, showing more sense than he'd thought they had, and now he was envious. Envious, because they could leave when he couldn't. Envious, because they could die when he couldn't. Envious, because... just envious. Envy and misery and hopelessness all swirled together in his gut, a noxious cocktail that threatened to rise in the back of his throat and drown him. Drown him like the lake couldn't. Or wouldn't.

And so he roamed, looking for something, maybe absolution, maybe death, and maybe the two weren't mutually exclusive of each other anymore.

He wandered until he saw lights, bright, twinkling lights, standing out absurdly in the gloom. It looked like a string of Christmas lights draped around a door frame, and he followed it, drawn like a moth to the flames.

James Sunderland-widower, wanderer, failure, murderer-staggered towards the lights, and when the fog slowly released its hold on them, allowing them to shine through and come into focus, he thought for a moment that it was another deception, another lie created out of dust and memories, sent there to torment him further.

But no... the lights were real, their feeble twinkling like a torch to his dazed eyes, their light outlining a door. The door to Heaven's Night.

It was only appropriate that the last place open to him was a run-down, trashy bar and strip club.

He opened the door and passed under the lights, entering the sombre, murky gloom of the bar. Dull red neon flickered on the walls, advertising liquor and cigarettes and rubbers, and the stage and pole in the back of the long room were illuminated by light bulbs casting a sickly yellow glow, the kind of light that would jaundice even the healthiest skin, would turn a young woman into a craven, ancient hag.

He wandered to the bar and slumped in a bar stool, gazing dejectedly at the bottles lining the wall in front of him. The bottles were coated with dust, undisturbed for years, for lifetimes, and the mirror behind them had been broken, shattered by some unspeakable violence and then never replaced.

James crossed his arms on the bar and let his head sink into them. He wondered if he could just stop breathing, make his heart stop beating, the neurons and synapses in his brain stop firing. He wondered if he could just stop, because stopping would make the pain, the confusion, the hopelessness... it would make everything end.

Something rustled behind the bar.

Once, an unexpected sound would have sent him in a flurry of nerves, adrenaline and muscles and senses all working together, all primed towards survival. Now, he sluggishly turned his head, not even bothering to pick it up out of his arms. Getting attacked, getting killed, getting released... it would be a blessing.

One of the monsters stood behind the bar now, its face inclined towards him. It was one he hadn't seen before; tall, lean, unmistakably human-shaped, wearing a long, apron-like smock with its arms bare, its hand encased in rough gloves. Its skin was darker than some of the other monsters, more brown than grey, and that disturbed him somehow; it made the thing look more alive, more real, than most of the other abominations. Its face was a smooth, flat expanse of scar tissue, featureless, expressionless, its only discernible feature small indents where its eyes should be, its brow casting dark shadows over the space.

James studied it; he didn't have the strength, or the drive, to care what happened to him anymore, and that gave him the freedom to really observe the thing. It was awful, hideous, something from a nightmare, like all the creatures here, but it wasn't acting aggressive. It almost seemed... curious.

"Who're you?" he finally asked it, his voice shockingly loud in the empty space.

The thing tilted its head at him, and he belatedly realized that, if it didn't have a mouth, it probably couldn't answer him. Just another failure on his part, just another lost opportunity to not make the wrong decision. At least he was staying true to form.

The monster's hands moved, and he saw that it was holding a bar glass in one hand, a rag in the other, and... was it actually polishing the glass? It was, its long fingers sliding in and out of the glass's wide mouth, turning it delicately and deliberately, making sure to touch it on all sides with the rag. It didn't move its head while it did this, keeping its face turned towards him.

"You're the bartender?" he asked, feeling a muted interest rise through his apathy.

The thing gestured towards its chest with one hand, and for just an instant, there and then gone, James thought he saw a name-tag flicker into existence on its apron. _Valtiel._

He sighed and put his head back into his arms. If it was going to kill him, it was going to kill him... if it wasn't going to, it wouldn't. In a way, he hoped it would, that it would spring over the bar and attack him; he wouldn't fight it. He would welcome it. Why bother fighting when he couldn't even get suicide right? Why bother when everything he'd ever tried, everything he'd ever done, had ended in failure?

He heard the faint tinkle of glassware, and something shifted near his head. Groaning softly, he turned again to see what the monstrous bartender-Valtiel- was up to; if it was going to kill him, he hoped it would hurry up and just do it already. Maybe dying was something he could get right.

Two shot glasses, lined up neatly on the bar, swam into his vision. The monster had its back to him, its hand reaching up and searching among the bottles behind the bar, which suddenly didn't look as old and dusty as they had before. He picked his head up, a spark of curiosity giving him more life than he'd felt in long, long time.

The bartender turned around, a bottle in hand, and expertly poured two shots of clear liquid. The acrid stink of vodka assaulted James's nostrils, and he noticed the distinctive white trees and dusted glass of the bottle in the monster's hand. Belvedere vodka. Top shelf.

The monster finished pouring and then nudged one of the glasses closer to James's hand.

He grunted; with everything else that had happened recently, doing shots with a faceless bartender didn't seem like that strange a proposition. He sat up, took the shot glass in one shaking hand, slopping a little vodka out and onto the bar, and threw it back. The alcohol burned a hot trail down his throat, and bloomed a small fire in his stomach. He shuddered, feeling a little warmth for the first time in a long time. It was familiar, this; he'd spent so many nights just like this, hunched over a bar, throwing back shots, repellant in his isolation, deflecting other bar patrons as easily as if he'd been a leper. Alcohol was about the only thing that had made him feel warm anymore, the only thing that created any heat in him since Mary... since Mary...

The bartender poured him another shot.

He looked at it, and it set down the bottle so it could pick up the other shot glass. It raised the glass towards him in a salute, then tossed the shot back. He watched it closely, trying to see what happened to the liquid, but it all happened too fast for his eyes to follow.

With a shrug, he picked up the other glass and threw it back himself. "Might as well," he muttered, his eyes watering, as he set the glass back on the bar with a clang. "I mean, why not?" he asked, a little louder, focusing on the bartender. "You wouldn't be the first bartender I got trashed with, Valtiel."

The thing nodded a little, as if to acknowledge its name, and the bottle tilted again, the shot glasses refilled. James quaffed this one without any hesitation, feeling the fiery trail open up inside him, feeling the oblivion start to descend, the dark curtains start to fall over his tortured mind. His head drooped a little; he could hold his alcohol, but three shots in five minutes was a little much even for a man of his size. Two or three more and he'd be on the floor, sleeping it off, and maybe that wouldn't be so bad... maybe he'd go to sleep and never wake up, his dreams filled with the memories of the alcohol's illusionary flames, the aching loneliness banished by the vodka's somnolent waves.

He felt a hand under his chin.

He started, sitting up straight and pulled backwards; he wasn't used to being touched, especially on the face, especially here, where he equated touch with pain.

Valtiel had reached out, was propping his head up, and the thing's touch was gentle, surprisingly tender, not aggressive at all. It was slouching downward, bending from its great height, so it was level with his eye line, and it had its head cocked in a way that looked almost... concerned. Its hand was warm on his chin, the heat of a human body coming through the gloves to sear his skin.

"Stop that," he muttered, and swatted the thing's hand away. "I don't need your pity."

The thing straightened back up, and James realized how tall it really was; taller than him, and he wasn't a short man. It loomed over him, and he cringed away, because it suddenly reminded him of the other monster, the other tall thing that wore the red helmet, the pyramid-headed thing.

Valtiel leaned across the bar, getting its face close to his, and James shrunk backwards, the action instinctive, involuntary. He gripped the bar with white-knuckled fingers; the thing suddenly didn't seem so non-threatening anymore. Perhaps it had been the comparison to the pyramid thing, the Pyramid Head, but James found that he had enough self-preservation left to still be afraid, to still want to keep as much distance as he could between himself and the monster.

He felt those warm, gloved hands clamp down on his forearms, and when he gasped and tried to pull away, the hands tightened like iron manacles. His vision swimming from the vodka, James moaned deep in his throat and tried to twist away from the thing, his mind shrieking with an abrupt, fervent desire to live, to escape, to not submit to this thing and whatever it was going to do to him.

Valtiel kept its face close to James's, blocking most of his view, but from out of the corner of his vision, James saw one of its legs stretch upwards, jointless, rubbery, and plant on the bar, closely followed by the other one. The thing was crouched on the bar now, still gripping his arms, and he could swear that its featureless face was grinning, somehow.

In a whirl of sharp, explosive motion, the thing simultaneously lunged over the bar and spun him around, jerking him to his feet at the same time. James stumbled, his reflexes dulled by vodka, and would have fallen if Valtiel hadn't looped its arms underneath his and propped him up. He gasped, feeling the thing behind him, its body pressed against his, as close as a lover, as a second skin, as a twin in a diseased mother's womb. Something about the texture of the thing was wrong; it was somehow both slick and rough, not human at all, and yet the warmth emanating from it was very human, very real, and it was almost like being held by another person instead of a monster.

James shook his head, confused, and the thing pressed its face in towards his neck, nuzzling at him like it was trying to kiss him, and he felt the bony outlines of sharp, pointed teeth under its skin.

He froze, one part of him reeling in the horror of it, of the blasphemy of the thing's embrace, another part of him (a low, base part of himself that he'd been trying to forget for a long, long time) actually welcoming it, preening at the attention, wanting more, reveling in sensations long denied. His entire body trembled while his tortured mind tried to make sense of it all, and Valtiel must have interpreted the motion as desire; one long arm curled around James's chest, restraining him, and the other hand slunk downward, sliding across the crotch of his jeans, rubbing lasciviously at the growing bulge there. James squeezed his eyes shut, horrified at his body's betrayal, but unable to resist when his hips thrust forward, into the monster's waiting palm.

Valtiel made a sound deep in its throat that sounded like it might have been laughter, and its hand tightened on James's shoulder. Panic reared its head as the monster's fingers bit into his flesh, breaking the skin, but it all-the panic, the pain, even the pleasure-felt so far away, like he was watching it happen to someone else. His mind floated, drifted away, removed him from the bar, from the town, and he found himself focusing his blurry eyes on a light bulb on the stage that was flickering in the most fascinating way.

Suddenly, he found himself face-down on a table, the air knocked out of him, his nose bloodied, and his torso aching from the impact. Valtiel was standing behind him, one hand gripping his hip tightly, the other snarled in his hair, pushing his face down onto the sticky wooden tabletop. The monster was surprisingly strong, and James, the panic now front and center in his mind, the strange drifting sensation gone for the time being, squirmed under the thing's grasp. Its fingers tightened in his hair, and the thing lifted his head a couple of inches off the tabletop, only to slam it down again. The blow dazed James, and he barely felt it as the monster jammed its hips against his rear and began writhing. He shook his head as best he could, trying to clear out the cobwebs, trying to make some sense of it all, but he was distracted by the insistent jabbing at his backside. Distracted not only by the fear and panic over what was happened, but also by the way his body was responding. Against his will, against all reason and sense and instinct, he was responding to the monster's rough caresses.

Had it really been that long? Had he really been so lonely, so desolate, for such a long time that he was reduced to this... acceptance and, yes, even gratitude, at the attentions of an abomination? He didn't want to believe it, and inside his head part of him was screaming, furious and horrified and repulsed, but he also couldn't deny the stirrings of something else, something dark and secretive and long-ignored, as it lifted its head from the ashes of his soul and hissed, its eyes glowing embers in the shadows.

Valtiel made that chuckling sound again, and then James heard the screech of fabric ripping and felt the town's cool air on his naked skin. His jeans, the tough denim shredded, sagged and flapped around his hips, and he cringed away from the monster's hand as it roughly prodded at him, exploring places ignored and nearly forgotten.

The monster ignored his feeble attempts at escape; it stopped holding his head down, still making that godawful strangled laughter sound, and grabbed his hips with both hands, sinking its fingers in. It leaned heavily on him, and he felt something hard and slick rub across his ass cheeks, trying to force itself between them, towards what the monster had been pawing at only seconds before.

James groaned, his face still on the tabletop, his hands clenched into fists. He felt the monster's grip tighten on his hips, and he knew that his skin would be blossomed with vivid purple bruises in the shape of hand prints when this was over. If it ever ended... if anything in this damned town ever ended, instead of cycling through, over and over, on some infernal loop of despair and hatred and anguish...

He heard, rather than felt, the sound of his teeth grinding together as a bright flare of agony bloomed behind him, as the monster started to force itself home. He knew this pain, but thought he'd left it behind years ago, stripped it from his life when he'd finally snapped, had enough, and chosen to have nothing rather than have the pain. And now, the familiar burn, the stretching, the ripping, and he choked back a sob, remembering that crying made it worse, crying made it last longer, crying got him hit afterwards and wasn't this torture enough?

"Stop it, stop it," he whispered into his fist, and if he could've heard his voice, he would have heard the voice of a child. Somewhere, deep in the recesses of his mind, he heard his father's voice, low and taunting... "you'll never have anyone but me, boy. No one will ever love you, no one will ever want you... except for me..." and then his father was laughing, the sound spiraling up into an insane cackle, and it blended and merged with the sounds the monster was making behind him until they were one and the same.

The door to the bar slammed shut.

Both James and the monster froze, Valtiel stopping mid-thrust, and its hands constricted, grinding around James's hipbones like it was trying to make its fingers meet through his flesh. Slowly, his neck creaking with the effort, James turned his head to see what had made the noise, and when he did, he nearly scrambled off the table and away from Valtiel in the extremity of his terror. The thing's hands left his hips and grabbed his shoulders, slamming him back down on the table, and it thrust its hips forward violently, finishing what it had begun, and James whimpered when he felt something give inside him and warm blood trickling down the inside of his thigh.

The pyramid-headed thing stood in the doorway, its head tilted to one side, looking for all the world as if it were studying them. Its chest was stained with fresh blood, and James realized with a sick feeling that the blood was probably Maria's. Or maybe it was his, or Eddie's, or Angela's, and what the hell did it matter, when that thing was involved blood got spilled, and now it was eyeing them up like they were prizes to be won, and even the other monster has frozen when this one came onto the scene.

The pyramid head came closer, its tread slow and heavy, walking around the table until it stood at James's head. James cowered backwards, into Valtiel, trying to get away from it, and Valtiel's grip on his shoulders changed, rearranged, into a more possessive one, like the monster was staking a claim to him. The pyramid head grunted, the sound amplified in the still space, and reached down, coiling its fingers in James's hair.

James went limp; he could feel the thing's fingers circling, wrapping the longish strands of hair between and around them, and again, the monster didn't seem particularly aggressive. He waited, but the blow never came, the sudden twist to sever his spinal cord, visualized so perfectly in his mind, never occurred... only the thing's hands, playing with his hair, and the other monster, buried inside him, its hands holding his shoulders, keeping him pushed flat on the table.

"Do it," he rasped, and at the sound of his voice, both monsters stopped what they were doing. He couldn't see either of them, but he could sense they were both looking at him, studying him again with their eyeless faces. "Do it, goddammit, just... just kill me already, get it over with!"

The pyramid head made a noise, a wet, gurgling sound, that might have been choking or might have been laughter, and Valtiel did something that sounded like a damp hiss. The hands in his hair tightening around his skull, claiming it, at the same time that the hands on his shoulders clamped down, grinding the bones and tendons together.

Something in the air changed; the atmosphere was suddenly rigid with tension, and something passed between the two monsters, something ancient, wordless, and fraught with hidden meaning. The pyramid head's hand shifted, and James realized that he could look upwards out of the corner of his eye, could keep a watch on the thing, would be able to see his impending death at the thing's hand. The thought was comforting, actually; he might have failed at everything else in life, but he would watch his death come at him with his eyes wide open, face it like a man, and maybe succeeding that one time would mean peace and oblivion every after.

From his position down on the table, he could see under the thing's helmet. The helmet wasn't solid, as he'd assumed, but open on the bottom, and from this angle he could actually see up underneath it. Most of the space under the pyramid was in shadows, but he thought he could see the outline of a jaw, of a throat, the skin grey and scarred, like the thing had once had its throat ripped open by a set of horrible claws. He strained his eyes, trying to see further, but the rest of the thing's face was lost in the darkness.

The pyramid head tilted, and suddenly his head was wrenched around, the delicate bones in his neck squalling and crackling, the hands in his hair rippling with untold strength and violence. James's eyes were level with the thing's crotch now, the view under the helmet lost above him, and he realized with growing horror that the thing's apron was twitching, moving sinuously as something grew underneath it. Valtiel snickered behind him, its hands sliding down his back and resuming their positions on his hips, and the monster started thrusting again, and for a moment all James could think of was the pain as it forced itself deeper into him.

Gripping the top of his head with one hand, the pyramid head reached down with the other, and its apron made a slick, sliding noise as the monster pushed it to one side. James squeezed his eyes shut, not wanting to see what the monster was concealing, but catching a glimpse of something massive, something soaked and grey and covered with veins like writhing worms, all the same. The monster made that wet, laughing sound again, and Valtiel echoed it from behind him, and for a moment the world was full of laughter that sounded like something strangling, choking on its own blood. Then the pyramid head's hands were on his face, forcing his mouth open with strong fingers, wrenching his neck around to get him into position. James's eyes fluttered open in shock, and the world spun before him, all grey and blood-splattered and full of shadows, and he caught the scent of the pyramid head, a scent like rust and mildew and something that could only be described as burning bones, and he felt Valtiel shiver behind him, the monster's pace increasing and its body slamming against his, driving forward deep into his guts, and the sound of the monster growling deep in its throat. Then he felt it, the pyramid head in his mouth, driving down his throat, into his windpipe, huge and slimy and rigid, his jaw popping as it was forced wide open, and he was gagging, choking, trying to pull away, and the hands on his head pushed him forward, the thing impaling him further, and James barely felt it as tears started to pour down his cheeks.

The pyramid head was groaning, gurgling deep in its chest as it thrust into him, and Valtiel was making that laughing sound again, its hands cutting deep into the flesh and muscle on his hips, and James's eyes rolled back in his head as he let himself drift away. It was easy, a skill he'd once perfected and then deliberately forgot, and his mind floated above what was happening, away from his abused, violated body, and he hovered for a moment over the monsters, watching disinterestedly... there would be the pain later, and the shame, but for now it was happening to someone else, someone apart from himself, and he was free. He chased butterflies through the ether, following them, looking for a safe place, a refuge, until...

Until he was in a diner, a diner that gleamed white and clean, sparkling, smelling like lemon cleaner and hamburger meat frying on a grill, and he was sitting at the counter, clean and whole and unbroken, smiling at the pretty waitress, with her doe eyes and light brown hair, and she liked him too, would talk to him when she had time between tables. She was smiling at him now, her eyes bright and clear, her skin smooth and unblemished, expertly refilling his coffee cup, and asking about later tonight, what were they going to do?, and he would do anything for her, anything at all, and somewhere far away from the diner, his mouth twitched into a smile.

The pyramid head's hand tightened in his hair, lifting his head and then slamming it back onto the table, and James's head exploded with pain as his jaw splintered and cracked from the impact. He yelped in agony, and the diner was gone, he was back in his body, feeling everything that was being done to him, every thrust, every jab. He kept his eyes closed, breathing through his nose as the pyramid head pounded on the back of his throat, and endured. That was another skill he'd forgotten, another thing he had grown good at... enduring.

Valtiel went first, shuddering and bucking behind him, and he felt the hot, heavy sensation of being filled, of the thing finishing with its demonic lust, and the burn of torn skin drenched in acidic fluids. The monster pulled out of him, its hands finally leaving his hips, and he felt the warm, sticky mixture pour down his legs. His knees buckled, sagging underneath him, and he gripped the tabletop with his hands to avoid sliding off entirely, afraid that if he did, the pyramid head wouldn't let go of his hair and would rip his head off at the neck.

Would that be such an awful way to die? Probably a ripping, tearing sensation at the base of his neck, maybe he'd hear the sound of his neck shattering, and then... oblivion. Sweet, peaceful oblivion. His fingers loosened on the table's edge, his arm muscles relaxing, and he felt himself start to slide backwards.

The pyramid head's hold tightened on his head, and the monster pulled him forward at the same time that it violently thrust its hips towards him, and James's throat filled, and he choked, the cloying, gagging fluids exploding outwards, pouring from between his lips and pooling down his windpipe, and for a few terrifying seconds he couldn't breathe, he was going to drown on it, it was too much, and then the pyramid head let him go, and he slid backwards off the table and landed in a heap on the floor.

James curled in on himself, tucking his aching, throbbing body into the fetal position, and panted, not even aware he was sobbing until he heard the sounds of someone weeping and realized it was him. The monsters stood over him, looking down from their great height, and from this position they seemed to stretch on forever, their heads ending somewhere up near the ceiling.

"Well?" he rasped at them, in a voice barely recognizable as his own. "Aren't you going to finish it? Aren't you going to finish what you started?"

The pyramid head didn't respond, barely even acknowledged him, busy with readjusting its apron, but Valtiel made the laughing noise and raised one hand. James cringed away from it, expecting a blow, but the monster merely extended one finger and shook it back and forth at him, and he could have sworn that it was grinning again.

The pyramid head grunted, once, and then turned and slouched away, pushing open the bar's door and exiting into the foggy night. Valtiel grinned at him for a moment longer, taunting him with its 'ah ah ah' gesture, and then followed the pyramid head. James jumped, sending a jolt of pain through his ravaged body, when it slammed the door on its way out, the sound ringing through the now-empty bar.

James curled on the bar's floor, feeling sticky and exhausted and ashamed-the shame ran so deep, as much a part of him as his bones and sinews-and gave himself over to the weeping, letting the tears run down his face and mingle with the thick fluids coating his chin and lips. He felt like he might never stop crying.


End file.
